The invention relates to an adaptor for connecting a miniaturized electronic storage module, especially a miniature card with 60 surface contacts, to a personal computer (PC), a notebook, or similar data processing system with PCMCIA port, whereby a PCMCIA socket is provided at an end face of a card-shaped outer housing which is connected especially by soldering connections to electronic components of a circuit board, whereby at the opposite side contact fields, corresponding to the surface contacts of the miniature card and provided with conductive rubber strips or contact springs for electrical contacting of the miniature card, are arranged below a housing window with a frame for insertion and removal of the miniature card.
So-called miniature cards are miniaturized electronic storage modules for different applications. At present, especially the use for digital cameras as so-called flash cards is of interest where directly digital data of the camera are written onto the miniature card and stored therein. Other known applications are voice recording and voice reproduction systems. For further processing of the thus used miniature cards, adaptors are provided which are connectable to a data processing system and thus connect the miniature card mechanically and electrically to the data processing system. For this purpose, the adaptor has at its end face a PCMCIA socket. The data processing system must therefore be provided with a corresponding PCMCIA slot in order to provide for mechanical and electrical and electric contacting of the miniature cards via the adaptor. The adaptor comprises among other things a PCB, controller components, driver components, and storage components as well as contacting elements. It is then possible to transmit via the adaptor data, for example, from the notebook onto the miniature card or vice versa data written onto the miniature card in other applications data onto the PC platform.
The miniature card is inserted into a housing window provided in the plug-in card-shaped outer housing, below which a receiving frame is connected which allows insertion and removal of the miniature card. The miniature card is provided with 60 surface contacts which are positioned in an elongate depression at the underside of the miniature card in the form of a contact field. A corresponding contact field with a conductive rubber strip or contact springs for electrically contacting is positioned in the frame below the housing window and is connected with the printed circuit board of the adaptor so that via the surface contact connection the miniature card, when inserted, is connected to the printed circuit board of the adaptors and via the adaptor is thus connected to the PCMCIA socket at the end face which is inserted into a respective slot of a PC, notebook, or other data processing system with PCMCIA port for data exchange.
It is a disadvantage of such an adaptor that the high contact forces of greater than 60N which are applied upon insertion of a miniature card via that conductive rubber strip onto the outer housing, may result in deformation which, in turn, prevents the secure contacting of the conductive rubber strip at the contact pad of the contact field positioned therebelow. Compensation of the occurring forces by the thin bottom sheet metal of the outer housing is not ensured. In cases in which between the contact field of the adaptor and the outer housing a printed circuit board is arranged, the mechanical stability and stiffness in the contact area is not sufficient. Especially the operational safety of the adaptor is additionally impacted by manipulation because especially its use as an exchangeable medium results in stress from transport such as bending, torsional, and thermal loading. A simple mechanical reinforcement of the adaptor with increased wall thickness in the housing area is not possible because the dimensions with minimal tolerances as a standard, especially for the PCMCIA type II, are set so that only minimal constructive variations are possible.
The invention has the object to increase functional reliability while avoiding the aforementioned disadvantages, especially in the contacting area of the miniature card, so that the high occurring contact forces can be received without causing damage over the lifetime of the adaptor with minimal constructive expenditure.